


Just Another Brick In The Wall

by ArmageddonGeneration



Series: Jon and Damian, Sitting in a Tree [3]
Category: Batman (Comics), Super Sons (Comics)
Genre: Badass Damian, Damian needs love, Demon teacher, Jon needs love, M/M, Mutual Support, Pre-Relationship, School, Super Sons - Freeform, Superhero patrol, protective damian
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-04
Updated: 2017-04-04
Packaged: 2018-10-14 23:20:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,545
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10546050
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArmageddonGeneration/pseuds/ArmageddonGeneration
Summary: Sometimes night patrol gets a little too interesting. Now Damian has to juggle helping Jon with homework and not getting set on fire.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Cosmic_Flame](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cosmic_Flame/gifts).



> Jon is12  
> Damian is 15

Damian has burned before.

He throws three batarrangs and the window shatters. Combat roll out, into open air, free-fall with the shards, grapnel out, fire the line, using his gravity to accelerate the swing.Flames vaporize the space he'd been in a second before.

Lynns laughs. It sounds like a bonfire crackling.

Damian hits the next roof too hard, too fast, he's off balance already; smoke inhalation has made everything blurry around the edges. Take cover behind a water tower. Give yourself two seconds. Breathe, deep lungfuls of cold, clear air.

_This was how he'd died. The first time, before the Heretic, before Robin. His first time in the field with Father, foiling Mother's plans, stranded in the no-man's land between them. Unsure._

_Father had her in a corner, they'd beaten her, together. Mother just smiled. Damian still has nightmares about that smile. He realized what she was going to do the instant before she did it; he was running, reaching, he screamed her name._

_She pressed a button, and the world went to white and brimstone and hellfire._

_Damian had burned_.

Lynns floats out of the broken window, a cinder on a current of warm air. Behind him, the building groans, and the roof collapses in a whirlwind of ash and sparks. He's singing; Damian can hear it rising with the smoke.

_"Gotham's burning, Gotham's burning..."_

The lenses of his mask glimmer in the firelight.

Damian takes a breath, and dives out of his hiding place, another batarrang flying. Get to higher ground, find a blind spot, go for the jetpack -

Lynns spots him, brings his flamethrower round fast; the batarrang vanishes in a torrent of blue and gold. Damian runs, and the flames chase after him, a dragon's tongue licking at the asphalt just behind his feet. He swerves, dives for the fire escape on the adjoining building. He slams into the metal railing, tasting blood, but he can make it. He swings his leg over the rail -

A grenade lands in front of him.

Muscle memory kicks in and Damian uses his other leg to push off the railing, pivoting back towards the roof -

The grenade explodes, and a white-hot fist punches Damian square in the back. He lands on the roof, barely, manages to turn it into a tumble. Above him, Lynns laughs again. Damian reaches for his belt, finds the smoke pellets, throws them down to give himself cover -

\- smoke everywhere, for a second he's trapped back in the burning building. Ten years old and being shredded by the heat -

He has enough sense to run, fast and low to minimize the target. Find cover, there, the roof entrance. He presses up against it. _Breathe_.

His phone rings.

Damian taps the communicator on his ear. This will be Grayson or Father, they'll come up with a plan.

"Hey, Damian." Jon chirps, "I'm calling in a favor."

It takes a second for the voice to register. It's so bizarre, summer sunshine through an ash cloud, Damian just sort of freezes.

"Now really isn't a good time." he wheezes. He needs to get a voice machine, like Grayson, so idiots don't disturb him at work.

_Hi! Sorry, but Dick isn't available right now due to prison breakout-slash-alien invasion-slash-death trap-slash-homicidal maniac on the loose, but if you'd like to make an appointment..._

"Why not?" Jon asks.

"Because I'm busy trying to keep Firefly from roasting me alive." Damian peeks around the corner. The smoke has cleared, but Lynns hasn't seen him. He's just hanging there, a black silhouette against the moon.

"What, the flamethrower jetpack guy?" Jon snorts derisively, not at all like him, "Oh, c'mon Dami, with my powers I could beat him in my sleep."

"Well you're welcome to come down here and help." Damian snaps. Jon goes very quiet, and Damian realizes how desperate that sounds.

_The League had fixed him after the burning, of course. But only on the inside. The burns were more than skin deep._

"Damian, you're fine." Jon says.

"Tt. I know that."

Lynns is floating forwards now; the muzzle of the flamethrower sweeps the rooftop like a searchlight.

"No, listen to me." Jon insists. "You're fine. You can do this. You know you can."

Yes, he knows, but nobody else ever listens.

"Listen," Jon continues, "this guy has nothing on you. You're smart, you're tough, and you're a lot scarier than him."

"I know, I know. I am Robin, I am the son of Batman -"

"No," says Jon, annoyed, "you're Damian Wayne."

That pulls Damian up short. He feels very warm all of a sudden. It must be the fire.

Jon is right (God help him, the world must be ending). Damian above this D-lister.

Lynns lobs another grenade behind an air conditioning unit to Damian's far left, trying to flush him out. A pause, while timer ticks down, then an explosion. He lobs another; closer. Damian braces and counts the seconds, breathing steady. Jon isn't talking now, he's letting him concentrate.

One, two, three...

The explosion rocks the roof and the heat sears his face, but now Damian is ready. He peeks out again, watching as Lynns pulls his arm back, calculating the angle.

Lynns throws the grenade, and Damian leaps. He snatches the thing put of the air, then down, zig-zagging across the roof. Lynns fumbles with the flamethrower, but he's let it go to make the throw. Damian holds, counting under his breath.

"One, two -" He turns, and lobs the grenade in Lynns' face.

Normally, this sort of thing would turn your enemy into charred chunks, and Damian would probably end up being grounded for a year. Luckily, Lynns spends a lot of time setting things on fire and, as Damian understands it, he's learnt the hard way that unless he's careful, one of those things would be himself.

So Firefly's suit is, essentially, bomb-proof.

The explosion still generates enough kinetic force to knock him backwards. Damian is already running, grapnel out, scaling the shell of the burning building in three easy bounds. He pushes off, and pirouettes in mid-air. Lynns flies back to meet him.

Damian's elbow smashes into the back of his head. They spiral downward into an alley, trailing flames. Lynns swears and lashes out, Damian ducks and they bounce off a wall like a pinball. Lynns hits a button on the jetpack and they shoot back up into the air, but Damian's got his arms around the man's neck now, and clings on like a monkey. They're off-balance and slam into a wall again, scraping down the brickwork with a fountain of sparks behind. Damian jerks Lynns' head down and they go careening into a dumpster.

Lynns is out cold. Damian lies on his back, taking a second just to appreciate how much that _hurt._ Gradually, the breath comes back to him.

"Dud it work?" asks Jon's eager voice in his ear. Damian heaves himself out of the dumpster, and picks a banana peel out of his hair.

"Yes. It worked."

"Yeah!" he can imagine Jon punching the air, "my brilliant master plan was a success!"

"Literally all you did was tell me to fight him and hope."

He ties Lynns up and sets a beacon for the GCPD to find him, but decides to leave him in the dumpster with the rest of the trash.

He can hear Jon pouting through the comms.

"Excuse me, but without my inspirational example you'd be toast right now."

"Tt. You know we mere mortals aren't fireproof, so we actually need skill and precision to defeat our enemies."

"Yeah, yeah."

"And did I just hear you admit I scare you?"

"Is that what I said?" Jon asks innocently.

Damian fires off the grapnel. No more super-crime tonight, he thinks. Just a good old fashioned mugging to wind down.

"You know if you wanted to be really helpful, you could always come and patrol with me." he tries not to make it sound to hopeful.

"And steal your thunder? No way!"

Damian suddenly wants Jon to shut up and leave him alone. Down the street, a jewelers' burglar alarm goes off.

"Besides," Jon mutters, too quiet, “I kinda maybe possibly need your help."

"Surprise, surprise. Shit."

Below him, one of the jewel thieves catches his shadow in the moonlight. As one, they dive for their car, bounty in tow.

"What is it?"

"Some criminals are getting away with millions of dollars in diamonds."

"Great." Jon says absent-mindedly, "Can you help me with a math assignment?"

Damian almost lets go of his grapnel line.

_"What?"_

"Math. You're pretty good at math, right?"

"Pretty good at -" Damian splutters, "I have _PhDs_ in mechanics, statistical analysis, code brea-"

"Cool." Jon cuts him off quickly. The getaway car roars around a corner; Damian looses another line and swings after them, tight and low, then arcing upward, letting his cape flare and catch the wind. They were just ahead of him now.

"Why are you getting me to do your homework? Mrs. Lane is certainly smart enough to help."

"Mrs. _Kent_ , Damian, jeez." Jon sounds angrier than he should be. "Or just call her Lois. And, well, it's just a little embarrassing, having to ask your mom for help with homework, y'know?"

He's lying; no matter how much Damian tries to teach him, Jon's never lied well.

One of the thieves rolls down a window; the barrel of a semi-automatic shines in the moonlight. The gun chatters, and and Damian twists in mid-air to avoid the fan of bullets.

Besides, he thinks as he lands lithely on the car's trunk and smashes the back window in, Jon's home life is a sickening fairytale stew of positive attitudes, complete understanding, and weekend baking (the thief in backseat screams in terror and Damian silences him with a throat jab) he has no reason to fear embarrassment. 

"Jon," he begins carefully, "is something wrong?"

Grayson always says to try and be gentle when you're trying to help people. Unfortunately, Jon balks.

"No! Of course not!"

Todd says you should just hammer them until they give you what you want. Damian thinks he likes this way better.

"Don't be stupid," he snaps, slicing the car's tires with a batarrang. The steering wheel wrenches out of the driver's hands and the car flips; Damian launches himself clear just in time, and watches as it skids upside-down for a hundred meters before colliding with a fire hydrant. "Do you want me to lay out the evidence for you?" he asks, walking forward. No one's dead, so he retrieves the diamonds and is on his way.

"Please do." says Jon.

"Well, considering how unconcerned you first were about a pyromaniac almost singing my face off, I'd say something's wrong."

"Someone's got a high opinion of himself."

Damian tuts.

" _Please_ , you get teary eyed when someone gets a paper cut. And considering how overconfident you were about beating Lynns with your powers, this isn't a problem you can solve with them."

"You're just jealous because you don't have any." Jon huffs irritably. Damian sniffs.

"I tried superpowers once, but they really aren't all they're cracked up to be, so I gave them up." He drops the diamonds at the gawking shop owner’s feet, and finds a rooftop where they won't be disturbed.

"You _lost_ your powers after like a week." Jon protests.

"They offered little tactical advantage;" Damian insists, "so I relinquished them willingly."

" You jumped out of a _window -"_

Damian cuts him off.

"That was a scientific experiment, and you are avoiding my question."

Jon hushes, and Damian waits for him to assess all his options.

"It's not that big a deal." he says finally, and Damian knows. The truth settles like a stone in his stomach, because he knows this is something Jon won't let him help with.

"... You're being bullied, aren't you?"

When Jon finally speaks, he sounds very young. Very vulnerable.

"... How did you know?"

"Deductive reasoning. Father's been teaching me." For a moment, Damian has a burning desire to turn off his comms, forget this conversation and lose himself in the night and the city. He's never been good at this kind of thing (there, he admits it).

"Great. You can read minds now, that's all I need." Jon sounds defeated, and suddenly Damian wants to be there with him instead, to take him by the shoulders and shake him until he's fixed. Jon doesn't deserve to be beaten. Not by anybody.

"Do you want me to dangle them off a building by their shoelaces?" he suggests.

"No!" Jon says hurriedly, as Damian knew he would. "Definitely, no." Jon sighs, and suddenly he's aged fifty years and sounds far too old. "She's a teacher, and she's almost sixty, you can't hang her upside-down off a rooftop."

Damian is incredulous.

"You're getting this worried about an _old woman?"_

"You've never met Mrs. Crakehall." Jon says gravely, "This is a matter of life and death."

"You're being a complete baby -"

"Last lesson the whole class failed a surprise pop quiz, and she's given us two hours' detention for a month."

Damian is aghast.

_"A month?!"_

"Erasing textbooks." Jon confirms, "I actually asked Dad to make sure she wasn't a robot or something, y'know, with his x-ray vision. Turns out she's just evil."

"And what work has she given you?"

Jon goes through the list. Damian has fought many evils in his time, but the thought of that much _boring_ in one night makes his stomach churn. Jon will be lucky if he gets any sleep at all.

"Surely she's not allowed to subject you to such torture?"

"Oh, she enjoys it. But she's already taking up half my nights, and if I flunk this I'll basically be living in her office for the rest of the term."

"But you're Superboy!" Damian yells. "You need to be out here fighting the war with me, you can't let her get in the way!"

" Damian, I can't just play hooky." Jon chides him like a naughty puppy.  Damian wants to punch him.

"She's taking advantage of your moral center! Only I'm allowed to do that!"Can't he see he needs to stand up for himself? How dare he let this woman hurt him!

"Sure." Jon says impatiently. "Can you help me with math now?"

"Are you sure you don't want me to -"

"You're not. Killing. Anybody."

"Even a little?" Damian wheedles. He uses his fists to solve problems, he's not good at talking to people like Jon.

"No!"

"But she's bullying you!"

"Are you jealous?" Jon snickers.

"Yes! You're mine!"

Jon goes dead silent. Damian's brain hits the emergency brake. 

_Wait what, why the hell would you even say - stupid, Jon's going to think you're so creepy, idiot, never going to talk again, idiot, you shouldn't care, why do I care, stop caring -_

Damian starts talking before he drowns in silence.

"I mean, do you know how many times I have to stop myself putting Todd back in the ground when we go on patrol together? Good... good partners are hard to find and I've, uh, I've put a lot of work into making you adequate!"

The words spill over each other like a pile-up on a freeway, the silence still hangs, and Damian is just about to throw the comms in the gutter and find a criminal's face to break when Jon finally speaks.

"'Adequate'," he laughs nervously, "gee, thanks. How many times have I saved your life again?" Damian realizes he's been holding his breath, and forces himself to exhale. Jon coughs. "Look, she's a lonely widower being mean to people so everyone else feels like she does."

"Hmph." Damian doesn't trust himself to speak again. He watches as some idiot on the street stops a pedestrian and demands her wallet with a knife. Time to go to work.

"C'mon. I helped you beat a supervillain tonight. Return the favor, will ya?" Jon pleads.

"Fine." Damian hits the sidewalk. The mugger sees him, and this one really isn't a criminal mastermind, because he charges right at him.

"OK." Jon begins. The knife flashes past Damian's ear. "Question 1..."

...

The school gates have never looked more intimidating. Jon walks across the yard with Kathy, clutching his thick wad of homework, plagued by a vague fear that he'll lose it between here and the classroom and then never be able to leave again.

After much grumbling, Damian had helped him work through the questions. It had still taken a long time, because Damian would occasionally refuse to go on and instead invent some new way of getting rid of Mrs. Crakehall (admitting her to Arkham asylum, boom-tubing her to Apokolips and giving her name to Jason Todd had all come up). At one point, he'd suggested they fix Jon up with a new identity, so he could live in Wayne Manor and go to school in Gotham.

Jon had been sorely tempted.

More of the class have joined them now; everyone's chattering nervously about the homework - Marvin hasn't done it because he lost the sheet; Susan has a consolary arm on his shoulder, like a nurse at the bedside of a terminal patient.

The class hushes within twenty feet of Mrs. Crakehall's door. They file inside like mourners at a funeral. Silent. Waiting.

One minute ticks by, then another, then a third; whispers begin to circle class like a breeze through a wheat field. Mrs. Crakehall is never late; she yells at you if you aren't _early_ enough to her lessons. Something's wrong.

Kathy turns to Jon, probably to ask what he thinks has happened to her, but Jon's mind is a whirlwind of flashing swords, exploding dentures, prune juice spiked with cyanide and old ladies' hearts giving out as they stare down at the street forty floors below.

He wouldn't, would he?

Another minute passes, and Jon is just thinking, _oh my god, I killed her,_ when the door bursts open and a teacher in a worn tweed suit rushes in, chest heaving.

"So sor- so sorry I'm late." he gasps, clutching the teacher's desk for support (bad move, Mrs. Crakehall could spot finger marks on her surfaces from fifty feet. She would have killed the man if - No. Going to, not would have. She's going to, because she's not dead, she's probably just eaten a bad prune, nothing poisoned -). The new man regains his breath and straightens. He has kindly eyes, like Dad's, crinkly from lots of smiling. "Turn your textbooks to chapter three, please."

The class murmurs. Kathy raises her hand.

"Excuse me sir, but where's Mrs. Crakehall?"

The new teacher looks confused.

"Nobody told you?"

Jon grits his teeth and prepares for the worst. If Damian has killed her, will Jon be able to cover for him? Claim it was all his idea and keep Damian out of prison? He has to try.

"Mrs. Crakehall," announces the new teacher, in a voice Jon thought fitted a eulogy, "has changed jobs."

_What?_

Jon opens his eyes, slowly, expecting an attack.

"She was offered a new position very suddenly last night. Head of discipline at a new Wayne Foundation Academy, the next state over. It's all been very fast, but I understand the perks they offered were too good to refuse."

This takes a minute to sink in. There are several barely stifled shouts of joy from the class. Marvin starts laughing uncontrollably, and needs go and sit in the corridor until he calms down. Jon sits back in his chair, and stares unseeingly at the chalkboard. It could be a cover-up. Damian could have pretended to be Miss Crakehall and phoned the school; he's good at mimicking voices.

But - Damian said he wouldn't hurt her, and, he's only a tiny bit shocked to realize, Jon trusts him.

Their new teacher is writing something on the board, and Jon finds he can actually understand what's being taught.

Huh.

_Son of a -_

...

"Y'know it's really hard to be mad at you when you haven't actually done anything wrong." Jon complains on the phone later.

"You're welcome." says Damian smugly. "

"You moved her to another state."

"Of course. I hear it's quite a troubled area; they need an iron fist to keep them in line."

"I kinda feel sorry for them."

"Don't be. Anyone will tell you, for someone who can _stomach it,_ " he lets the implication hang just long enough for Jon to stick out his tongue at the phone, "a strict sensei will do wonders."

"She's teaching them algebra, Damian, not how to use throwing stars."

Damian waves him off.

"That's neither here nor there, they're both instruments of torture."

"Guess I'll be able to do my own homework now." 

There's a very unhappy sounding silence. Downstairs, mom calls Jon for dinner.

"OK, gotta go."

"Goodbye."

"Oh, and Damian?"

"Yes?" He's trying to sound bored.

"Thanks."

There's a long pause, like Damian's not sure what to do with that.

"... You're welcome." he clears his throat, "of course, when I repay a favor, I do it in full. It's a matter of professional reputation. Besides, you said I couldn't solve the problem in the sensible -"

"Violent."

" - _sensible_ way, and you know how I love a challenge."

Jon grins, and hits the end call button.

**Author's Note:**

> So, this is longer than the others. It was murder to write, and I don't think it's as good. Please tell me any thoughts in the comments ; was the action OK?  
> As always, thanks for reading!


End file.
